A’amal al-Arafah – By Imam Husayn A.S.

Praise belongs to Allah, whose decree none may avert, and whose gift none may prevent. No fashioner’s fashioning is like His fashioning, and He is the Generous, the All-embracing. He brought forth the varieties of unprecedented creatures and perfected through His wisdom all He had fashioned. Hidden not from Him are harbingers, nor lost with Him are deposits. He repays every fashioner, feathers the nest of all who are content and has mercy upon all who humble themselves.

He sends down benefits and the all-encompassing Book in radiant light. He hears supplications, averts afflictions, raises up in degrees, and knocks down tyrants. For there is no god other than He, nothing is equal to Him. “Like Him there is naught, and He is the Hearing, the seeing, the subtle, the Aware and He is powerful over all things”.

O Allah, I make Thee my quest and bear witness to Thy Lordship and acknowledging that Thou art my Lord and to Thee is my return. Thou created me from dust, then gave me a place in the loins (of my fathers), secure from the uncertainty of Fate and the vagaries of the ages and the years.

I remained a traveler from loin to womb in a time immemorial of past days and bygone centuries. In Thy tenderness, bounty and goodness toward me Thou did not send me out into the empire of the leaders of disbelief, those who broke Thy covenant and cried lies to Thy messengers. Rather Thou sent me out to that guidance which had been foreordained for me, the way, which Thou made easy for me and in which Thou nurtured me. And before that Thou were kind to me through Thy gracious fashioning and abundant blessings.

Thou originated my creation from a sperm-drop spilled and made me to dwell in a threefold gloom among flesh, blood and skin. Thou gave me not to witness my creation, nor did Thou entrust me with anything of my own affair. Then thou sent me out into the world for the guidance that had been foreordained for me, complete and unimpaired. Thou watched over me in the cradle as an infant boy, provided me with food, wholesome milk, and turned the hearts of the nursemaids towards me. Thou entrusted my upbringing to compassionate mothers, guarded me from the calamities brought by the jinn and kept me secure from excess and lack.

High art Thou, O Merciful! O Compassionate! Then when I began to utter speech Thou completed for me Thy abundant blessings. Thou nurtured me more and more each year until, when my nature was perfected and my strength balanced, Thou made Thy argument incumbent upon me by inspiring me with knowledge of Thee, awing me with the marvels of Thy wisdom, awakening me to the wonders of Thy creation which Thou had had multiplied in Thy Heaven and Thy earth, and instructing me in Thy thanks and remembrance. Thou made incumbent upon me Thy obedience and worship, made me to understand what Thy messengers had brought and made easy for me the acceptance of Thy good pleasure. Thou were gracious to me in all of this, through Thy succour and kindness. Then, since Thou created me from the best soil, Thou were not satisfied, my God, that I should have one blessing without another. Thou provided me with varieties of sustenance and kinds of garments and Thy tremendous - most tremendous - graciousness to me and Thy eternal goodness toward me.

And finally, when Thou had completed for me every blessings and turned away from me all misfortunes, Thou were not prevented by my ignorance and audacity from guiding me toward that which would bring me nigh to Thee or from giving me success in that which would bring me close to Thee.

For if I prayed to Thee Thou answered, if I asked of Thee Thou gave, if I obeyed Thee Thou showed Thy gratitude, all of that was to perfect Thy blessings upon me and Thy goodness toward me. So glory be to Thee, Glory be to Thee, who are Producer and Reproducer, Laudable, Glorious Holy are Thy Names and tremendous Thy bounties. So which of Thy blessings, my God, can I enumerate by counting and mentioning? For which of Thy gifts am I able to give thanks? Since they, O lord, are more than reckoners can count or those who entrust to memory can count or those who entrust to memory can attain by knowledge. But the affliction and hardship, O God that Thou turned and averted from me is more than the health and happiness that came to me.

And I witness, my God, by the truth of my faith, the knotted resolutions of my certainty, my pure and unadulterated profession of Unity, the hidden inwardness of my consciousness, the places to which the streams of light of my eyes are attached, the lines on my forehead’s surface, the openings for my breath’s channels, the parts of my nose’s soft point, the paths of my ears’ canals.

What my lips close upon and compress, the movements of my tongue in speaking, the joining at the back of my mouth and jaw, the sockets of my molar teeth, the place where I swallow my food and drink, that which bears my brain, the hollow passages of my neck’s fibers, that which is contained in my breasts’ cavity, the carriers of my aorta, the places where my heart’s curtain is attached, the small pieces of flesh around my liver, that which the ribs of my sides encompass, the sockets of my joints, the contraction of my members, the tips of my fingers, my flesh, my blood, my hair, my skin, my nerves, my windpipe, my bones, my brain, my veins, and all of my members, what was knitted upon them in the days when I was a suckling baby, what the earth has taken away from me, my sleep, my waking, my being still, and the movements of my bowing and prostrating, that had I taken pains and had I striven for the duration of the epochs and ages - were my life to be extended through them - to deliver thanks for one of Thy blessings, I would not have been able to do so, except by Thy grace, which alone makes incumbent upon me never-ending and ever-renewed gratitude to Thee, and fresh and ever present praise.

Indeed, and were I and the reckoners among Thy creatures ever so eager to calculate the extent of Thy bestowal of blessings, whether past or approaching, we would fail to encompass it through numbers or to calculate it’s boundaries. Never! How could it ever be done! For Thou announce in Thy eloquent Book and truthful Tiding, Thy Book, O God, Thy Message, has spoken the truth! And Thy prophets and messengers delivered Thy revelation that Thou had sent down upon them and the religion that Thou had promulgated for them and through them.

And I witness, my God, my effort, my diligence, and the extent of my obedience and my capacity, and I say as a believer possessing certainty, “Praise belongs to God, who has not taken to Him a son” that He might have an heir, “and who has not any associate in His dominion” who might oppose Him in what He creates, “nor any protector out of humbleness” who would aid Him in what He fashions. So glory be to Him, glory be to Him!

“Why, were there gods in earth and heaven other than God, they would surely go to ruin” and be rent. Glory be to God, the Unique, the One, “the Everlasting Refuge” who “ has not begotten, nor has He been begotten, and equal to Him there is none” Praise belongs to God, praise equal to the praise of the angels stationed near to Him and the prophets sent by Him. And God bless His elect, Muhammad, the Seal of the Prophets, and his virtuous, pure and sincere household, and give them peace.

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